Tales (and other musings) from the Baklava Penninsula

Novi Sad – Palac, Serbia

We ended up biking through the Balkan Penninsula for a long time – probably spent 40 days. At first I thought the Balkans were just the former Yugoslav countries – Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia. Then we realized that Albania was part of it as well. And now I find out that Greece, the part of Turkey that is north of Istanbul, Bulgaria, and Romania are all officially in the Balkans. 

It’s a bit difficult to see what unites these places. 

They talk about the mountain range – the Balkans – but that doesn’t seem right. Southern Romania is basically dead flat – and the mountains in northern Romania are the Carpathians, not the Balkans at all. 

It’s definitely not the language; I mean, all the former Yugoslav countries speak some variation of Slavic, but then there is Albanian, Greek, Turkish, and Romanian – none of which are even related to Slavic. 

Nor does religion define the region. Much the opposite. The Orthodox, the Catholics, and the Muslums always seem to be at each other’s throats.. 

But then I realized that there is one obvious unifier. 

Duh! 

Baklava! 

And once you understand that basic fact, there is only one real conclusion: someone messed up the spelling of the penninula. Undoubtedly, the original name had been written in Cyrillic or Greek. The poor transcriber looked at it and did his best. 

B – Yes, there is a B in Cyrillic and in English. Got that right.

A – Same idea.

K – Got the order wrong, but there is a K in both alphabets and in both words.

L – Just transposed the K and L. Easy mistake to make. Probably knew that there were the Balkan Mountains around here, and just assumed that the original was wrong . . .

A – Yes, got this right.

V – The Cyrillic V looks like our B. He was probably like: “Well, there’s not an extra B in any word that I know. Just more evidence that the original word was Balkan . . . Let’s just assume this was mistake and drop this letter altogether . . .”

A – Looks kind of like N. Must have been what they meant . . .

And there you go. The transcriber wound up with BALKAN when it was obviously BAKLAVA originally. Poor guy . . .

I actually think it’s well past time to correct this grevious mistake. After all, the word Balkan has pretty negative connotations these days. War torn countries. Different religions duking it out. Different ethnic groups hating on each other. Heck, to Balkanize something is to split it up in a way where you pretty much know there will be major resentments. 

Now think about Baklava. Everyone loves it. Honey. Butter. Walnuts. Filo dough. Evokes the Mediterranean, and sweet pastry shops. 

And this re-branding could put an entirely new spin on conflicts around here. Albania and Serbia have a conflict? Rather than spend lots of money and human capital on a war, just have a baklava contest. They could even make money off of this idea: The Great Balkan Baklava Show. I can see it in syndication . . . 

Who do we talk to about this? 

Okay, on a more serious note I was thinking that this entry – coming after we biked through eleven of the twelve Balkan countries – would be about our profound conclusions about the region. But all we can really talk about is our impressions – based on a very small sample size and a few short conversations. 

So what you’re going to get instead is a little bit of geography for context, and a few of the things that I’ve found myself thinking about as we’ve been pedaling along. 

Geography. The total land mass of the Balkan Peninsula is about 667,000 square kilometers – about three-times the size of the State of Minnesota, or a little smaller than the State of Texas. Big in some ways – but kind of crazy to think of eleven or twelve (depending upon whether you count Kosovo) whole countries jammed into one of our states. 

Things I’ve Been Thinking About . . .

There are a lot of honey bees in this part of the world.

I guess to support all that baklava-making. As a beekeeper myself I’ve found myself re-committing to that past time. 

Now, as you probably know, I’m a pretty terrible beekeeper; my bees always seem to be dying out . . . So I’ve been thinking of joining a beekeeping club, and maybe even finding a place for my bees to overwinter in the future. (Theoretically they can survive our winters by huddling together, but it doesn’t seem to help their long term prospects) Diana and I have been in the practice of going to Bentonville, Arkansas the last few years in the spring and fall to go mountain biking. And our friends Gunnar and Maria live down there. Gunnar’s even become a beekeeper.

So I’m thinking maybe we pack the bees up in the fall, drop them off for a balmy winter in the Razorback State, and then pick them up again in the spring – with some bonus mountain biking along the way . . .

I never knew it before, but the Balkans might be the fruit tree capital of the world. Tons of plums, cherries and apples. I guess there are lots of pears as well – it’s the symbol of Serbia – though we didn’t see quite as many of them. 

Anyway, seeing all these fruit trees – and some of the products that they make with the fruit, has me excited to return to the little orchard we started a few years ago. A while back, I made some cider – and that was good – but I see Diana and I making a lot more cherry jam, and apple sauce, and cider, and rakija, and mead. And, of course, I see Diana making a lot more apple pie and cherry pie, and all the other desert items that she can cook up. 

All of which means more stuff like this for our friends . . .

So be nice . . . 🙂

Oh, and I guess you can tell that I’ve developed an interest in writing. I kind of half-heartedly started writing a novel at one point. It’s central theme involves a pastie shop in the U.P., where they also sell baklava. The place was started by an immigrant. Riding through the Balkans has given me a lot more ideas on where that immigrant came from and where her pastie and baklava recipes might have originated . . . So I’m pretty excited about seeing where that takes me as well . . .

Bottom line – More than maybe anyplace else on our trip, I’d say the Balkans have inspired me to think about my next chapters. Maybe it’s the semi-agrarian nature of the world and economy down here. Maybe it’s the climate – that seems to be relatively similar to what we see in Minnesota. Maybe it’s the people. I don’t know. I just know that these are the things I’ve been thinking about as the wheels keep turning . . .

One other thing I wanted to mention in terms of my thoughts. You’ve probably picked up on my ideas on religious and cultural pluralism. As far as I’m concerned I’m pretty happy to let anyone practice any religion they want. But – there’s always a but, isn’t there? 

But I do have limits. There are obvious limits . . . Like religions that call for the sacrifice of children. Or cannibalism. That type of thing. 

And I guess I’m just not real excited about the whole burqa thing. 

We ended up encountering a lot of them in Sarajevo – which surprised me, because I had understood Bosnian Muslums to be pretty moderate. 

I have a few things to say on this . . . 

First off, I HATE masks generally. I hated masks during COVID. I’m a huge believer in personal relationships being a big part of what makes for a better world – and wearing masks is just generally terrible in that regard. You can’t see people’s facial expressions. You can’t see their smile. It’s like trying to communicate via text or email. Always a bad idea. Of course, if they’re absolutely necessary then fine.

Second, I guess I get the idea of modesty, but burqas go way beyond modesty. They seem to be about ownership and domination. “I own this woman so completely that you cannot even lay eyes on her.” Maybe this is what people believe – but I don’t have to like it. 

Don’t worry, there are for sure elements of Christian churches that I find repugnant as well. I’m equal opportunity that way. Like women and gays not being able to lead a congregation in some denominations. I just point out the burqa thing because it’s really the first time that we’ve seen a lot of it in person – so it’s on our minds.

This is a bit of a late post so expect some more intel on Hungary and Budapest – coming soon to a website near you…